Does the Sex Issue liberate The Yale Herald? By reading it, by publishing an article or a poem, have the last twenty years of Heralders become sexually liberated? Does the Herald provide a platform to speak freely about sex for the first time in our lives?
In The History of Sexuality, Michel Foucault argues against a blanket theory of Western sexual repression. Believers in this theory posit that before the seventh century we were sexually free, open to talking and learning about sex: “the coarse, the obscene, and the indecent.” Then, the Victorians, as a result of the industrialization of the eighteenth century, transformed sex into a mere function of (heterosexual) reproduction to fuel a labor force. The Victorians repressed us; any speech about sex was improper. Tomorrow, these believers say, once we reignite the conversation about sex and liberate ourselves from the oppression, “sex can be good again.”
Foucault argues the exact opposite. Instead of this unsustainable theory of general repression, he says that throughout the eighteenth century there was actually an “incitement to discourse,” an explosion in the ways and methods we talk about sex. Sex became an interest of the state in population studies, sex became an interest of psychiatry. Through this process, sexuality was stratified, we were placed into boxes, our beings were defined according to sexual preferences.
Essential to this process of control, and inherent to the Sex Issue, is confession. While originating from the Catholic confessional in the Middle Ages, we continue to exhibit a constant need to confess. We confess to therapists, friends, parents, maybe even professors; it’s the easiest way to form a relationship. We have begun to feel that something about ourselves, a quintessential part of our identity, is hidden deep inside and can only be revealed through a series of confessionals. Through this confession, by releasing our thoughts onto another, we can find relief. We recognize this relief by writing for an audience, and maybe that relief takes the form of an article written for The Yale Herald…
By encouraging us to explore and confess the various facets of our sexualities, by publishing and distributing it for all of Yale to read, is the Herald liberating us? No, not really. Big Herald convinces us to tell him everything in the form of a quirky article, poem, or review. He gains pleasure from reading our every thought about sex, our sexual experiences, our fantasies. We confess our deep dark secrets and get published. Mr. Herald keeps our secrets, analyzes them, and prescribes a method for the “best” way to live a sexual life. Our Editors-in-Chief are too busy trying to review strip club food to notice.
I mean, have you seen the Herald’s sex glossary? The Herald wants to know how we talk about sex, what words we use for sex acts just to redefine them in their own way. After the Sex Issue, we might not even know how to have a real conversation anymore. What is “polishing the bayonet”? Will referring to sex as “porking” or “making whoopee” make us unashamed of our sexualities and preferences? I’ve never said “doinking” before, but after reading the sex glossary, I’ve begun to reconsider. Big Herald’s influence has only just begun.
Clearly he derives his pleasure from this control, this power oppressing his faithful writers and readers. But, why are we contributing? Why have there been so many Sex Issues if we are just being used?
Foucault argues that the spiral of power and pleasure is essential to repressing and controlling sexualities. Power structures gain pleasure from repression and control; repressed people gain pleasure from denying this repression, by subverting the power structures. Everyone gains pleasure by refusing the other, and nothing changes.
Are we falling for the Herald’s agenda? The Herald seems to have given us a chance to liberate ourselves. To write an article for the coolest, indiest publication on campus and be sexually liberated at the same time seems like a win-win. But, now he knows that we want to experience a spot of rompy pompy. With twenty years of confessions like these in the archive, who knows what Big Herald will do to us. At least we get a moment’s respite from our repression.
Maybe we just want to be heard. Maybe we want some other Herald reader to relate in our sexual fantasies, to know we are not alone. Maybe I’m a hypocrite that just wants everyone to know I read Foucault. We all derive some unmeasurable amount of pleasure from the Sex Issue or else it wouldn’t exist.
While we think the Sex Issue might be liberating us by creating and sharing different conversations about sex, perhaps we are just perpetuating a cycle of repression that will never end.
Where do we go from here? How do we end this cycle? I don’t know, I’m not Foucault. Big Herald told me to do a Foucauldian analysis, and I listened.